Frequently Asked Questions

What is Experiment?

Experiment is a community for funding and sharing real scientific discoveries. Over 67,000 members supporting 637 funded experiments are helping to push the boundaries of knowledge.

What happens if a fundraising campaign doesn't reach the goal?

Experiment is an all-or-nothing fundraising platform. If the project doesn't reach it's goal, then none of the backers are charged.

Who funds projects on Experiment?

Everyone! That’s the beauty of the Internet, it allows anyone with a credit card to bring real science to life.

What is the reward for funding science?

Experiment researchers share the outcomes of their experiments directly with their backers. Usually this comes in the form of peer-reviewed journal publications, conference proceedings, academic posters, graduate theses, open data sets, and more.

Does anyone review the science behind the projects?

Our team will review and approve each experiment before it launches publicly. Check out our start page for more information on our review criteria.

What is the cost of starting a project?

It is free to start a project. Once a project is funded, we take an 8% platform processing fee which keeps the site running.

Is any institutional overhead included?

Experiment's policy is that funds transferred to researchers are not subject to institution overhead. Read our payouts guide for more information about working with your university.

Is Experiment a non-profit or for-profit organization?

Experiment is a mission-driven for-profit company. Though really, we're a happy melting pot of science, social entrepreneurship, and technology startup.

What are the evaluation criteria for potential projects?

What are some examples of successful Experiment campaigns?

What is the Open Access badge?

Projects with the Open Access badge mean that the researcher pledges to release all results of the project in an openly accessible way. Whether it's lab notes posted on Experiment or a final peer-reviewed article published in an open access journal, we encourage all researchers to do so. Click here to learn more about why Open Access is important.

How much technical information do I have to share about my experimental idea?

We only encourage transparency and openness as a way to help your backers understand the scientific impact, but there are many other ways to do so without giving up your secret sauce. Click here to learn more about this.

How do academic researchers use Experiment?

Experiment is often used to replace small grants for early-stage exploratory research. Other times, it’s used to supplement larger projects. Just don't treat it like a grant, with the expectation of writing a proposal and expecting money to come.

What is the funding success rate?

Experiment has a 47.4% success rate.

Can I delete my launched project?

Projects that have launched can not be deleted. When the campaign ends, it will no longer be discoverable by common search engines, but the URL will still exist.

Can I launch a project outside of the U.S.?

At this time, we are only hosting projects run by scientists based in the United States. Projects where you are a United States researcher, but conducting research abroad are eligible.

The next countries we will expand to are Canada, UK, and Australia. If you would like to be part of the pilot please submit this short questionnaire.

If you are based elsewhere, let us know how to reach you and we'll notify you as soon as Experiment is available in your country.

Are the donations tax-deductible?

Donations are tax deductible for select projects that are hosted by our partner 501(c)(3) organizations. Projects are labeled with the tax-dedutible tags on their project pages. If you would like to make donations to your project tax deductible, get in touch with us after you've submitted for review.

Can I get a refund?

No, all payments that are charged once a project has met its goal are final.

How do I reset my password?

How can I contact you?

Our team at Experiment would love to hear from you! You can email us directly. We like to write long-winded personal emails, and sometimes we attach pictures of cats and Neil deGrasse Tyson. br

Community Guidelines

Content Moderation

We take the responsibility for promoting content very seriously. It’s not just the ability to freely converse that makes a community, but also knowing that your opinions and expression will be fairly treated by the community.

On occasion, we will shadowban users if their behavior falls under any of our policies listed below. Shadowbanning will render that user's content invisible to other community members, but will allow that person to otherwise continue using the site normally.

1. SpamIf a user is spamming unrelated or irrelevant content (e.g. links to other pages, links to experiment campaigns), then that user will be warned once. If the spam continues, or it's clear that it's robotic, then we will ban the user.

2. Abuse / HarassmentIn the case that a user is insulting, harassing, or creating an overly negative environment, then shadowbanning may be used. In most cases, a warning beforehand should be sufficient, but if it’s clear that the behavior will continue, then a ban will be put in place.

Disagreeing with someone on the internet is a pretty common thing, but we honestly try not to censor content just because someone may disagree with what was said. The goal of our policy is to continually improve our community.

Security

At Experiment we strive to make sure our community is secure.If you would like to notify the team about any security issues, please email us. We reward handsomely in T-shirts and stickers.